By Laura Chandler

Today, the islands of Orkney are quiet and sparsely populated.  They are a pastoral haven from the modern world. The light on the islands is magnificent.  It stays dusk until well past 10pm in the summer and because Orkney is so far north, sometimes the sky is tinged purple and green, hinting of the northern lights.   It takes a few days to adjust to the relaxed pace of the place.  The land is beautiful and gentle with rolling green hills and lots of sheep and cows.  The airport is the size of a small elementary school and people here have no fear of leaving their doors unlocked or their keys in their cars when they run into the grocery store.  It’s village life circa 1920.  Of course, it’s not without it’s contemporary conveniences.  The town of Kirkwall hosts a wide variety of restaurants (including great Chinese and Indian) as well as an internet café, health food store, and several grocery stores to choose among.  There are many fine shops all a short walk from our lodging.  Perhaps this is the time to mention the weather.  Yes, Scotland gets a good bit of rain, but August is the nicest time of year with many sunny days and some warm enough to inspire the locals to put on shorts and t-shirts.

Beyond the quaint town of Kirkwall are one-lane roads through rich farmland and a near endless number of archaeological sites. Yet, despite being home to some of the world’s most outstanding Neolithic remains, there are relatively few tourists. So these places can be experienced without feeling crowded or rushed. In fact, there are quite a few sites on Orkney where you might be the only visitor. What you’ll notice right away about the construction and placement of these structures is that the level of organization, engineering skill, and knowledge required to build them is considerable. Among the more recent discoveries of the relatively young field of Astro-Archaeology is the fact that the Neolithic peoples of Orkney (and the British Isles) were aligning many of their structures with the movement of the sun, moon, and stars, demonstrating a remarkable knowledge and ability to track time, gauge seasons and perhaps even predict eclipses. Further, it appears that many of these sites were built in relationship to each other. This occurs at Maeshowe, for instance, where each year the sun at noon on the winter solstice extends through the 36-foot long entrance (three feet high) to illuminate the entire back wall of what has classically been thought of as a tomb. This so-called tomb appears as a large mound 115 feet in diameter and over twenty-three feet high. What is even more remarkable is that two standing stones set a few feet apart outside of the Ring of Brodgar several miles away perfectly frame Maeshowe between them. This demonstrates an advanced understanding of engineering at the very least and it is just one of many examples of this kind of occurrence in Neolithic Britain as well as other places in the world.

Archaeologists make new discoveries almost daily in the Orkneys. These offer us new understandings of the ancient people who lived there and challenge us to consider new ways of perceiving the past as well as the present. In the class on Ancient Scotland, we spend a great deal of time at Neolithic sites immersing ourselves in what remains. The path of Ancient Scotland is mysterious and certainly points to a greater understanding of the nature of reality, incarnation, and the cycles of birth and death. Just to sit among the sixteen-foot stones left standing in the abandoned circles, or to step into the womb-like vacuum of a cairn, offers the opportunity to connect with something deeper – perhaps it’s ourselves, or our past, or a people who have understood something that has been lost to us and yet is also within our grasp.